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Alex Epstein on Michael Moore’s Planet of the Humans

May 6, 2020 | Politics

Alex Epstein has two videos analyzing Michael Moore’s documentary, Planet of the Humans:   “The Five Things Planet of the Humans Gets (Mostly) Right.“
  1. Green energy is a high-impact industrial process
  2. Green energy has many undesirable environmental impacts
  3. Green energy is hugely dependent on fossil fuels
  4. “100% renewable” is energy accounting fraud
  5. Leading green energy advocates are a terrifying combination of ignorant and dishonest
“The Five Things Planet of the Human Gets Totally Wrong.“
  1. It evades how bad the “natural” planet was for human life.
  2. It evades how good today’s humanized planet is for human life.
  3. It evades our ability to create new value and grow indefinitely.
  4. It evades our ability to produce more value with fewer side effects (e.g., nuclear).
  5. It evaluates the state of the planet by an anti-human standard (unchanged nature), not a pro-human standard (human flourishing).

Civil Disobedience: Heroic California Napa Art Gallery Owners Re-Opening, Defying County Closure Order

May 2, 2020 | Politics

“We’ve risked everything; we’ve worked too hard and fought too long to bring our business to life, to keep it alive, and to grow it over the past 24 years to sit passively and watch it die for the unwillingness of some in the community to permit others to live and work on their own terms, to accept and deal with any marginal risk at their own judgment and discretion.” — Quent and Linda Cordair, Quent Cordair Fine Art Gallery

 
An open letter to the public, and to officials of the city of Napa, the county of Napa, and the State of California:We’re re-opening our art gallery in downtown Napa not later than 11 a.m., Monday, May 4th. Appropriate and adequate social-distancing protocol will be in place and observed. City, county, and state officials are being notified, with encouragement to adjust any policies and plans accordingly.
As of next Monday, our gallery’s doors will have been closed, by county and state order, for six weeks and three days. Over that span, the county of Napa, population 137,744 at last count, has recorded two deaths attributable to the COVID-19 virus, both from over three weeks ago, with 60 confirmed cases in the county total, of which 26 have recovered, by the most recent county report.
As of last Monday, according to the Register, there were three COVID-19 patients hospitalized in the county, including the one in intensive care
We’ve been averaging fewer than two new cases reported daily since the first two were reported on 3/22. There were no new cases reported in the county this past Thursday.
Testing for the virus is now available. Our hospitals — Kaiser, the Queen, Adventist Health — are all fine. As of today, there is no extant emergency in Napa County, no evidence of an imminent crisis, no evidence of an impending situation that wouldn’t be well manageable with available resources. It’s past time to start re-opening the local economy, with care, sensible precautions, continued and increased testing, and attentive monitoring.
For those for whom art is essential, the experience of enjoying the paintings and sculpture in our 3,000-square-foot space — a limited number of guests at a time, observing our no-touching policy — will be as safe or safer than venturing to Home Depot, Target, Walmart, the supermarket, the mini-mart, the liquor store, the gas station, the dog park, or even the restaurant for picking up take-out.
We have 30 artists and their families relying on us for support. We have employees to employ. We have bills to pay. We’ve risked everything; we’ve worked too hard and fought too long to bring our business to life, to keep it alive, and to grow it over the past 24 years to sit passively and watch it die for the unwillingness of some in the community to permit others to live and work on their own terms, to accept and deal with any marginal risk at their own judgment and discretion.
We welcome other Napa business-owners willing to join us in re-opening next Monday, if and as they are able and deem proper — but we’ll open alone if necessary.
Public officials: know that we’re prepared to risk fines, arrest, or jail. We’re pursuing resources for any necessary legal challenge, up to the Supreme Court if necessary. Our constitution and system of government was created and established to secure the right of each and every individual in these United States to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
There can be no life without work; there can be no work without liberty; and, with so many others, we’re increasingly unhappy being unable to work and live for lack of liberty. The present situation is untenable, unacceptable, unjustifiable. It’s unhealthy and unsustainable. Not dying is not living.
We’re going back to work. We hope to see you in the gallery soonest, hopefully to enjoy the art. If not, know that we’re prepared to defend our right to live, work, and interact freely, and that we will indeed defend our right to do so, if and as necessary.
Let’s not make it necessary. Please join us in working our way back to living well and fully — living mindfully, sensibly, healthfully, and productively — while respecting every individual’s right to work and to sustain their own life and well-being as they may.
We have an extraordinarily challenging road ahead. Let’s get Napa back to being Napa, with hope and optimism that it isn’t already too late to do so. Every day and every hour counts. We must get back to work, back to living, as well and as quickly as possible, while continuing to observe reasonable precautionary measures. It’s time.
Quent and Linda Cordair Quent Cordair Fine Art| NapaFirst posted online at the Napa Valley Register, 27 April 2020.
 
Amy Peikoff has an interview with the Cordairs on her podacast:https://youtu.be/ERHjhRFBfMQ

#MeSometimes: Tara Reade, Joe Biden and Justice Kavanaugh

Apr 29, 2020 | Philosophy, Politics, Sci-Tech

In this Analysis (download) of the Christine Blasey Ford Allegations, a 25-year prosecutor of sex-crimes shows that in a criminal court of law, Dr. Ford’s accusations against Justice Kavanaugh would be found baseless.Or in her the Prosecutor’s words,
“In the legal context, here is my bottom line: A “he said, she said” case is incredibly difficult to prove. But this case is even weaker than that. Dr. Ford identified other witnesses to the event, and those witnesses either refuted her allegations or failed to corroborate them. For the reasons discussed below, I do not think that a reasonable prosecutor would bring this case based on the evidence before the Committee. Nor do I believe that this evidence is sufficient to satisfy the preponderance-of-the-evidence standard.”
Some of the reasons for this include:
“Dr. Ford has not offered a consistent account of when the alleged assault happened.”“Dr. Ford has struggled to identify Judge Kavanaugh as the assailant by name.”“When speaking with her husband, Dr. Ford changed her description of the incident to become less specific.”“Dr. Ford has no memory of key details of the night in question—details that could help corroborate her account.”“Dr. Ford’s account of the alleged assault has not been corroborated by anyone she identified as having attended—including her lifelong friend.”“Dr. Ford has not offered a consistent account of the alleged assault.”“Her account of who was at the party has been inconsistent.”
Such is not the case with the account given by Tara Reade of her 1993 encounter with Biden.The response — or rather the non-response and silence — of the Democrats and their media allies, to Tara Reade’s allegations against Joe Biden, is ominous.It demonstrates that to the Democrats and their media allies, the #MeToo movement to “Believe Women” was nothing more than a weapon to smear their political enemies, such as Republican Supreme Court nominee, Justice Brett Kavanaugh.It is a vivid demonstration of the moral hypocrisy of the Democratic Party and its supporters.

***

Well, not all of them.Rose McGowan, the actress from the popular series Charmed, also a victim of convicted rapist Harvey Weinstein, slammed her co-star Alyssa Milano — a Biden supporter — on Twitter, saying:

You are a fraud. This is about holding the media accountable. You go after Trump & Kavanaugh saying Believe Victims, you are a lie. You have always been a lie. The corrupt DNC is in on the smear job of Tara Reade, so are you. SHAME https://t.co/B7NHK4k09K — rose mcgowan (@rosemcgowan) April 6, 2020

Furthermore, according to McGowan, the Washington Post’s “report” on the Reade allegations was nothing more than “victim shaming”:
“This is not journalism, this is an agenda. This is a hit piece. You’ve sunk to a new low in slanted journalism and victim shaming @WashingtonPost …“As a survivor, the way you launched into this woman’s assault is truly vile …. Your motto is ‘Democracy Dies in Darkness’ well I guess it’s dead because you are dark. Evil lives and it loves the DNC.”
Whether you agree with McGowan or not, at least she is consistent.

***

Of course, Biden should be held with the presumption of innocence by any objective standard.Yet, where was this presumption in the Kavanaugh House Witch Hunt Hearings?But the presumption of innocence — a legal application of the ethical principle of justice — is not the professed standard of the Democratic Party and the Anti-Capitalist “Progressive” New Left.To the Democrats and their media allies, “justice” is only necessary when it can be used as a political weapon to advance their lust for power, and like the Communist call for freedom of speech, can be dispensed with when it no longer serves their unjust purpose: the destruction of the American Capitalist Republic.

***

Update: Cathy Young over at the Quilette on “Tara Reade’s Dubious Claims and Shifting Stories Show the Limits of #BelieveWomen” (March 14, 2020) examines Tara’s Reade’s allegations and does not find her top be a “credible complainant.” Writes Young:
Last week, this theater of the absurd got slightly more surreal when a prominent feminist wrote in the New York Times that she thinks Biden is a rapist, but will vote for him anyway. Linda Hirshman, a retired professor of women’s studies and philosophy, and a prolific author (most recently of Reckoning: The Epic Battle Against Sexual Abuse and Harassment), explained to Times readers that she believes Reade, but also believes that “the cost of dismissing Tara Reade—and, worse, weakening the voices of future survivors” is justified on purely utilitarian grounds, since (as she sees it) Trump is the greater evil. Hirshman argued that the Democrats’ current strategy of defending Biden’s innocence is both cowardly (since it avoids the “hard work of moral analysis”) and harmful, since it means “casting a reasonably credible complainant as a liar.”[…]By casting the Democratic leadership as dishonest and cynical, Hirshman is kneecapping the party she says she supports.And she is doing it quite needlessly, because the totality of evidence suggests that Reade is in no way a “credible complainant.” Her credibility is further undermined by court documents that contradict her account of an entirely separate 1996 episode involving her ex-husband. In an ironic twist, these documents, part of Reade’s 1996–1997 California divorce files, were uncovered not through a dirt-digging expedition, but by researchers seeking evidence corroborating her allegations against Biden.
After much analysis of Reade’s complaints, she ends that whatever the outcome the Democrats have played into Trump’s hands:
Biden will probably ride out this scandal: As Hirshman candidly notes, there’s simply too much at stake in the election for Democrats to follow their #MeToo conscience. But if Reade’s claims really do sink Biden in November, the Democrats will merely be reaping what their moral panic has sowed. Hamstrung by slogans that depict half of the human population as inveterate truth-tellers incapable of dishonesty, the party has backed itself into a corner. Democrats must either stipulate that the church of #MeToo shall provide Biden with a one-off indulgence—or else urge Americans to vote for a presumed rapist. It’s hard to say which narrative would make Trump happier.

State Lockdowns Were Never Justified

Apr 24, 2020 | Politics

https://youtu.be/f9HLoWBYN84Human Flourishing advocate Alex Epstein interviews philosopher Onkar Ghate, Senior Fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute, on why lockdowns are not a proper response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Topics they cover include:
  • We need objective, clearly defined laws specifying and limiting the power of government in regard to infectious diseases.
  • Why Sweden has more American infectious disease laws than America does.
  • How clearly defined laws lead to better preparedness by government, industry, and individuals.
  • Why more profit-making in the health care system is key to scaling capacity.
  • How governments have failed to do their proper job of identifying and isolating infectious individuals.
  • How far greater transparency from government would empower a free people to make rational decisions.
  • The right way to handle potential hospital capacity shortages.
  • How the idea of “free” health care promotes irresponsible behavior.
  • Why state-wide lockdowns were not the right policy with the evidence we had.
  • Why lockdowns were a panic-based, not reason-based policy that should be removed as quickly as possible.
  • How governments should make policy and communicate to citizens going forward.
  • Why now is the time to write to government officials—and what you should write.
 
COVID-19 Roundup: (April 2020)

COVID-19 Roundup: (April 2020)

Apr 22, 2020 | Business, Politics, Sci-Tech

Fact 1: The overwhelming majority of people do not have any significant risk of dying from COVID-19. Fact 2: Protecting older, at-risk people eliminates hospital overcrowding. Fact 3: Vital population immunity is prevented by total isolation policies, prolonging the problem. Fact 4: People are dying because other medical care is not getting done due to hypothetical projections. Fact 5: We have a clearly defined population at risk who can be protected with targeted measures.

After providing evidence for the above facts he goes on to conclude:

The appropriate policy, based on fundamental biology and the evidence already in hand, is to institute a more focused strategy like some outlined in the first place: Strictly protect the known vulnerable, self-isolate the mildly sick and open most workplaces and small businesses with some prudent large-group precautions. This would allow the essential socializing to generate immunity among those with minimal risk of serious consequence, while saving lives, preventing overcrowding of hospitals and limiting the enormous harms compounded by continued total isolation.
A pandemic does not alter the role of a government. For example, it can limit the freedom of those individuals who carry the virus for limited periods to protect others, whose right to life would be violated. This could involve testing, tracing contacts, and tracking. When governments are involved in operating health care systems, as they are in most mixed economies, they would isolate nursing home residents and other vulnerable people, increase hospital capacity, and set guidelines for physical distancing—as opposed to violating everybody’s right to liberty by locking down economies.
We need to learn to appreciate progress—both what we’ve already done, and why we can’t stop now. We need to tell the amazing story of progress: how comfort, safety, health, and luxury have become commonplace, and what a dramatic achievement that has been.
More recently, in the wake of the Covid-19 virus outbreak, we’ve seen unwarranted, unprecedented violations of all three realms of freedom in America – mandates to close businesses, edicts that people stay in their homes (“shelter in place,” akin to a nationwide house arrest of innocents presumed guilty), decrees against assembling (compelling “social distancing”), orders restricting access to gun shops, even the classification of some street protests (against the illiberal controls) as prohibited because a “non-essential” activity.  We’ve yet to see challenges from the ACLU or court orders staying the rights violations. Why?
The lockdowns, whatever one thinks of them, were never sold to us as a way to eradicate the disease. They were sold as a way to “flatten the curve” so that the medical system didn’t become overwhelmed, leading to *unnecessary* deaths. […] We must open the economy as fast as we can. And we must do so while managing the disease as best we can. That includes selective isolation for the most vulnerable. (I have family members in this category…and, if it matters, they support re-opening the economy. They recognize that it would be immoral to demand that we sacrifice the whole country to reduce their odds of getting the disease.)
  • Alex Epstein’s video “A pro-freedom approach to fighting COVID-19″: (Power Hour, April 15, 2020):
If you’re seeking to avoid COVID-19, the hand sanitizer gel you carry in a pocket or purse did not exist until the 1960s. If you start to show symptoms, the pulse oximeter that tests your blood oxygenation was not developed until the 1970s. If your case worsens, the mechanical ventilator that keeps you alive was invented in the 1950s—in fact, no form of artificial respiration was widely available until the “iron lung” used to treat polio patients in the 1930s. Even the modern emergency medical system did not exist until recently: if during the 1918 flu pandemic you became seriously ill, there was no 911 hotline to call, and any ambulance that showed up would likely have been a modified van or hearse, with no equipment or trained staff.
If you are a scientist at an academic institution currently working on a COVID-19 related project and in need of funding, we invite you to apply for a Fast Grant. Fast Grants are $10k to $500k and decisions are made in under 48 hours. If you wish to apply to grants for scientific or biomedical COVID-19 projects, please apply through FastGrants.org.

Mac Donald: Coronavirus Disparities are a Culture, Not a Race, Problem

Apr 16, 2020 | Politics

Writes Heather Mac Donald on “Coronavirus Racial Disparities Miss the Bigger Picture” at Intellectual Takeout:
Coronavirus disparities are a class and culture, not a race, problem. Poor people everywhere have higher rates of obesity, diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease. If the incidence of infection among black New Yorkers and Chicagoans were compared not to that of Manhattanites and the denizens of the Magnificent Mile but to residents of southeastern Ohio and of areas around abandoned steel plants in West Virginia, those alleged race disparities would shrink markedly.There may be “structural” elements to obesity and hypertension, but those conditions are largely the result of behavioral choices that individuals can control. Playing the race card during a pandemic is not just politically corrosive, it is medically unsound.

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